The Forlorn Hope is composed of those warriors unlucky enough to be assigned to the vanguard of a planetary invasion. Dubbed the Forlorn Hope due to its near unit destroying casualty rate, these troops are responsible for carving out and holding landing zones in contested landings. The equipment assigned to this near suicidal mission is expected to be tough and reliable almost to a fault in order for the Forlorn Hope to complete its task. It was in this deadly environment that the Thunder Chief was designed to thrive.

The Thunder Chiefs name came from the principal two armaments the mech carries into battle, an extended range PPC and a Hammer Fist heavy gauss rifle. This combination the engineers felt would be able to cripple all but the largest of mechs placed against the Forlorn Hope. Backing these weapons a quad set of extended range medium lasers. While the weapons systems may seem weak for an assault mech the Thunder Chief was designed first and foremost to take an incredible amount of punishment before falling in battle.

From the outset the engineers threw away most weight saving features which only add to the fragileness of a mech. Two components that were used to allow the mech its long life span was the compact gyro and the heavy hardened armor. While the compact gyro is smaller and harder to hit, it does weigh 1.5 times more than a normal gyro. The hardened armor however provides the main punishment taking ability. Thirty tons of armor has been draped over the Thunder Chiefs Chassis making it the most heavily armored mech known in production. While hardened armor weighs twice as much as standard armor it can take twice the amount of damage.

[Game note: for every two points of damage received one point of armor is destroyed. If there is a remainder it also gets marked off I.E. an LRM 5 strikes a mech with hardened armor 3 points of armor is taken off 2/5=2.5 the .5 being the third armor point deducted]

Besides the weight of the armor plating being used by the Thunder Chief the second drawback to hardened armor is the reduced mobility a mech suffers. In order to combat the reduced movement the engineering team decided upon using triple strength mymor allowing the mech to gain back its former mobility as heat climbs, which it will do. Despite mounting 14 double strength heat sinks the Thunder Chief can quickly over tax the heat sinks causing pilots to mother their heat gauges.

Only one variant is being tested for possible manufacture, the TC1-a will mount a Ultra Class 20 autocannon in place of the heavy gauss rifle, one medium laser is removed to allow the autocannon four tons of ammunition. The TC1-a is being currently tested a city/siege buster mech where its slow speed is less burdensome to the pilots.

Currently the Thunder Chief has been assigned to the Davion Heavy Guards rebuilding efforts along with the multiple regiments of the Lyran Guards. Defiance is hoping to sell the mech on the open market shortly. However demand for the mech has speeded up the time to open market sales via the black market.

Comstar has been notified of two Thunder Chiefs being held by the Wolf's Dragoons infamous Wolf Net. The chassis numbers Def-TC1-3058-012 and Def-TC1-3059-003 was seized when Wolf Dragoon security forces busted up a black market ring on Outreach in July 3060. It is unknown to Comstar the expected customers or how these mechs made it to the black market. What is also unknown is how many more Thunder Chiefs may have found new owners through this black market ring.